


The Parties

by Tisaniere



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Tyler is not a hockey player
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-08-19 13:02:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 18,039
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20210185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tisaniere/pseuds/Tisaniere
Summary: Jamie goes back to Victoria for a summer of fun after the Dallas Stars crash out of the playoffs. And he gets to spend time with his summer best friend Tyler Seguin, who also happens to be the man of his dreams.In which Jamie Benn is an oblivious idiot, Paul Bissonnette fancies himself a matchmaker, Tyson's the most annoying best friend on earth, and Nathan Mackinnon can give love advice whilst nursing a broken heart, because he's a pro through and through.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [eafay70](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eafay70/gifts).

> I hope you like this! I had a blast writing it.

Jamie regretted many decisions he’d made in his life. It kind of came with the territory of being a professional sports star, and a captain at that. Sometimes, you’re going to fuck up and choose the wrong path. This was definitely one of those times.

“Seriously, Tyson, touch my radio one more time and I’ll push you out the truck.”

A chorus of ‘oooooh’ came up from the back seat.

“Jamie’s gettin’ serious.”

Tyson had that determined look on his face that preceded doing something he had been told not to. Jamie knew that look. He’d been friends with this guy for like 12 years, and he’d seen it too many times to count.

To no-one’s surprise Tyson reached out and changed the station again.

“If you got your bluetooth fixed, we could play something off of our phones. But you’re the cheapskate that won’t get anyone to look at it.”

“You ever going to learn to leave stuff alone?” Jamie asked, slapping at Barrie’s hand as he took what he hoped was the right exit off the freeway. He’d sort of lost track whilst watching Tyson fuck around with his radio endlessly.

“Be careful Tyson, he’s got his captain voice on,” Jordie commented from the back seat. He was mashed up against his dog Juice in the middle seat, who was drooling all over Nathan Mackinnon in the other window seat.

“Believe me, that never works with Tys. Ask Gabe,” Nate said. He tried to turn Juice’s head away but the dog was too happy staring out of his window.

“Jamie’s not even my captain, it doesn’t work like that. Let me change the station, I hate this song.”

“We’re like 5 minutes away, leave it!”

He didn’t see the turning in time and had to slap on the brakes a little bit to make it. The car behind him blared his horn in retaliation.

This. This was why it was a bad decision.

“You shouldn’t drive distracted Jamie.”

“Then don’t distract me!”

Mercifully the parking lot he needed came into view and he swung the truck into the entrance.

“I am never giving you a ride again Tys.”

Tyson made a yapping motion with his hand. “Blah blah blah. How many times have you said that?”

So many times.

The SUV rumbled over the scraggly hardtop that made the parking area for The Hunger Pines bar and diner. The restaurant had once made a roaring trade as a truck stop, busy day and night with people travelling up and down the highway, local families treating their children, and underage kids drinking their teenage woes away. As time went by the old fashioned charm of the place faded, and the highway intersection was adjusted so that fewer truckers ever bothered to stop off at this particular spot. The locals had newer, more exciting restaurants to cater to their modern tastes further over in town. The Hunger Pines mostly catered to vacationers on long-haul drives, and locals who wanted a decently fried meal in a place that was lenient on the new smoking laws. The underage drinkers remained steady customers.

Jamie caught a glimpse of Nate in the rearview mirror as he peered up at the place.

“I am starving,” Jordie announced, unlatching his belt. “Come on Juice.”

Juice barked once in response and followed Jordie out the truck. Nate let himself out and bent in half to stare at his crotch.

“Oh man, I’ve got a wet patch.”

Unfortunately he was wearing khaki shorts, and all of Juice’s drool had pooled nicely just to the right of his zipper.

“Wow,” Tyson said, appraising Nate’s groin with hands on his hips. “That’s not a good look. You look like you were dreaming about Crosby’s backhand again.”

Nate tried to dab at the stain with his shirt but it wasn’t budging.

“It looks like I jizzed myself!”

“That was kind of my point.”

Nate looked up at the Benn brothers with something like desperation, or a cry for help. Jordie nodded definitively. “Yeah. Looks like you jizzed yourself.”

“For god’s sake.”

“Good boy Juice,” Tyson cooed. Jamie tried his very best not to roll his eyes.

If the decision to offer to drive these guys to the diner was a bad idea, then the whole idea of bringing them at all was catastrophic. This was not how he imagined the reunion he was about to have with a certain someone in that diner.

It was June and the whole of western Canada had communally decided summer was here, lingering showers and cooler temperatures be damned. As a local Jamie was dutifully dressed in his shorts, a pair of sliders and a white shirt - any more would only make him stick out as a guy who now spent most of his year in one of the hottest states in the United States. Plus, he wanted to look casual. For various complicated reasons he couldn’t really dwell on.

He led the group across the tarmac and to the doors of the diner, Juice padding along obediently whilst Nate groused to himself and rubbed at his crotch.

Jamie pushed the door open and a comically petite bell chimed above him. The diner was empty except for a stressed out family with three kids in one of the booths. One of the kids was screaming about chicken nuggets. There was only one waitress on duty, picking at her nails at the pass. They watched her take her time collecting the right amount of menus and wander over without much energy.

“Welcome to The Hunger Pines. Where would you like to sit?”

Tyson apparently had very specific ideas about where they had to sit. He chose the banquette in the far corner, right up against where the windows met. Juice slid under the table to await falling food. Dogs technically weren’t allowed inside, but The Hunger Pines took inconvenient things like health codes with a pinch of salt.

So Jamie was here for a reunion. But the person he wanted to be reunited with wasn’t here. His palms were sweaty as he rubbed them on his thighs. The waitress took her time slapping the menus down in front of them and once she got to him he scraped enough courage to say: “Um, is Tyler here?”

She blinked at him owlishly from behind her glasses. “Which Tyler? We’ve got three that work here.”

“Oh, Seguin.”

“Yeah he’s here.”

The five of them were suspended in a awkward silence for an excruciatingly long moment: Jamie staring at the waitress, the waitress staring vacantly back, Jamie’s three lunch companions looking at them both over the tops of their menus.

“Could you get him?” Jamie asked eventually, in a strangled voice. The waitress sighed and muttered a ‘fine’ before heading to the kitchen area.

“Wow. They’ve got some talent working here,” Tyler said into his menu.

“That was so smooth,” Jordie told Jamie, his smirk clearly visible in his beard.

“Shut up.”

Disaster. This was an unmitigated disaster.

But Jamie didn’t have time to back out of this or throw himself through the single glazed windows because the double doors to the kitchen area opened and out came Tyler Seguin. His hair was longer, long enough that it curled delicately on the back of his neck. He summer tan hadn’t set in but he’d been working on it, if the little dash of red across his nose was anything to go by. He had new tattoos and broader shoulders. It was quite a sight. And Jamie was sure he was walking in slow motion over to the table, everything in the diner but Tyler fuzzy and out of focus.

Jamie stood up with a burst of nervous energy to give Tyler a hug and nearly sent the table flying. Which was pretty impressive, seeing as it was bolted to the floor.

“Hey Tyler.”

They hugged with Jamie in an awkward half-crouch around the limitations of the table. Jamie tried to count to three in his head so that he wasn’t hugging for a weird amount of time, but lost track around two.

When they finally parted he collapsed back into the banquette and his ass smacked against the unpadded seat painfully. Jordie stood up with a thousand times more grace and gave Tyler the kind of bear hug Jamie wished he could pull off as casually.

“Hey Seggy, nice to see you man.”

“You too Jordie. Beard’s looking good dude, how many birds you got nesting in there now?”

“Better than whatever this is,” Jordie mocked, taking Tyler’s chin in his fingers and turning it left and right. “You get a new fancy razor for Christmas or something?”

“Fuck off,” Tyler laughed, pulling his chin away. God, what Jamie wouldn’t do to have Tyler’s face between his fingers. Not for the first time in his life Jamie wished he had at least some of his older brother’s confidence. If he so much as touched Tyler’s face he’d probably fall over.

Tyler leant over the table to give Tyson the kind of obnoxious handshake Tyson liked to invent with everyone he met. Tyler was the only one who took it seriously.

“And you remember Nate? Not been here for a few summers."

"Sure I do. Welcome back."

They quickly discovered the source of a consistent banging that had started up since Tyler arrived was Juice wagging his tail under the table and patiently waiting his turn. Tyler got down on his knees and hugged Juice fully, burying his face in the dog’s fur.

“Oh Juice it’s good to see you buddy, how are you? The boys can’t wait to see you.”

When he finally got to his feet he was covered in dog hair.

“How long you guys been back?”

Between the three of them they relayed their entire life stories from the moment their respective teams were kicked out of the playoffs to the second they entered the diner. Tyler popped a hip against the back of the booth by Jordie’s head to listen.

“How long you been here Tyler?”

“Oh we got in like three weeks ago. Cassidy got a job at a salon, she needed to get down here as early as possible. I’m so glad you guys are finally here. It’s been boring.”

Jamie doubted that. He knew Tyler had a group of friends he hung out with aside from the Benn brothers’ entourage, and he was sure the burn on his nose and the tired look around Tyler’s eyes had something to do with them.

They’d been talking for about ten minutes before a loud and meaningful cough came up from the kitchen pass. Don Armstrong, foul tempered chef and owner of The Hunger Pines, had his arm propped up on the ledge and was glaring at Tyler across the dining room.

“Jesus, Seguin, I don’t pay you to stand around doing nothin'.”

“What do you want me to do, it’s empty in here?” Tyler yelled back.

“Take their freaking orders! I gotta know when I can take my next smoke break. Do your job, or I’ll get Jennelle to do it.”

Tyler rolled his eyes and pulled out his pad.

“I guess I have to serve you bums. Whaddya want?”

Jordie lifted his menu up and recited his usual order. “The Hunger burger, extra onions. And a coke.”

“Chicken tenders and fries for me. And a sprite.”

“Sure thing.”

Tyler looked to Nate next, who was still trying to make sense of the four page menu.

“Er…”

“I’ll save you some time, nothing on there is in any diet plan we have ever been given,” Tyson chipped in. “Just go with it.”

Nate shrugged and ordered steak with potatoes and a coke.

“OK. And Jamie, the usual? One Winner Winner Chicken Dinner with sweet potato fries and, what, a coffee? Or soda?”

“Coke. Thanks.”

“Coming right up.”

Tyler gave him a little wink before scooping the menus and taking off to the pass.

It took Jamie too long to realise he was staring after Tyler in silence. The wink had kind of blind-sided him.

“Oh god, here we go,” Tyson said when Jamie’s senses finally came back online and he turned back to the table.

“What?”

“Another summer of you staring at Tyler’s ass every time he turns around. We get it. It’s a nice ass. You’re never going to tap it, so give up.”

The table laughed. Jamie felt Tyson’s knee knock against his consolingly under the table and he laughed too.

“Fuck off, Tys.”

“Since when did Jamie fancy Tyler?” Nate asked, pretending like he didn’t already know the answer. Tyson was like a leaky ship when it came to keeping his oldest friend’s secrets.

“Well Tyler and his family have been coming here every summer for about fifteen years. And Tyler's worked at this diner for, what, ten years? So...fifteen years. Fifteen years, Jamie has wanted Tyler to be his summer boyfriend."

"And has yet to do anything about it.”

Nate frowned and turned something over in his head for a while.

“Dude,” was all he said, when whatever gears that had been grinding stopped.

“Insightful thinking there from my alternate captain.”

Jamie sighed. “It’s not that simple. And I haven’t fancied him that long. And I hate you all.”

All three of those things were lies.

By the time Tyler brought out their food the conversation had thankfully moved on to other topics. Namely, the expected arrival of Paul Bissonnette.

“He’s not seriously flying straight from Las Vegas?”

“Apparently.”

“He’s going to be wrecked. They won’t even let him board the plane. How much we gonna bet that he misses his connection?”

“Who the hell would bet _against _that?”

Tyler slid two plates across the table.

“Biz is on his way?”

“Yeah, he lands on Wednesday. If he makes it out of Vegas alive, that is.”

Tyler scooped up the final two plates where he’d left them on the serving tray.

“He’s going to be strung out by the time he gets here.”

“Don’t worry, Biz knows how to boot and rally.”

Tyler laid out the drinks and then started to budge up against Jamie.

“Wha-?”

“Move up, I wanna sit.”

Jamie did as he was told and Tyler flashed him a wide-mouthed grin. He felt warm and solid along Jamie’s side under his ill-fitting Hunger Pines shirt. Jamie was enveloped in an instant smell of just…Tyler. It made goosebumps prickle all over his arm.

Jamie had suddenly forgotten how to eat.

The group discussed their plans for the summer ahead as the four guys ate. As usual, the festivities would be a mix of relaxed BBQs and all-out house party nonsense. Tyson’s family lake house was on the list of venues, scheduled around when Tyson’s parents would be in town or away golfing, skiing, entertaining, sometimes all at once. Jamie and Jordie’s had their summer house as well, which they'd bought a few years ago from to give their parents a break from having both boys back, and from having to pretend not to notice a previous night’s house party. But it was also technically shared with their sister and her family, so the availability was always up for argument.

Between these two places, the group had everything they needed for a few weeks of revelry.

The planning carried on until they had a rudimentary plan sketched out, then the Hunger Pines chef started to bellow again.

“Yeah, alright, calm down!” Tyler yelled back. All he got in response was a cacophony of pans and plates crashing.

“Shit, I’d better go. See you guys tomorrow for the start of summer eh?”

Tyler squeezed Jamie’s arm, flashed him a smile, then stood up from the banquette and disappeared into the kitchen.

“You OK, Jamie? You need a minute? Cold shower?”

“Shut up, Tys.”


	2. Six Parties

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It took them fifteen years and six parties.

* * *

1.

Jamie and Jordie were used to throwing parties in their house, every summer. Back in the day it had been terrible, watery kegs smuggled in by friends’ older brothers, for an evening of testosterone fuelled postering by the guys and eye-rolling by the girls, sometimes leading to awkward fumbling in rooms guests weren’t supposed to go into. Now, with their NHL salaries, somewhat increased maturity and more self-confidence behind them, the Benns threw much better parties.

Jamie was in charge of getting everything ordered in, so with everyone about to arrive he made sure he counted everything properly.

“Stop stressing,” Tyson said, from where he was dicking around on his phone at the kitchen island.

“I need to count all of these.”

“Nate will help you.”

Nate frowned at Tyson. “Don’t _volunteer _me for shit, dude.”

“You’ve gotta earn your keep.”

“And what are you doing to earn your keep here?” Jamie asked. He had to start his counting again because of the talking. “When do you _ever _earn your keep? Anywhere?”

Nate raised a hand and Jamie high-fived it half-heartedly. He had to start counting again.

Jordie snuck up behind him and slapped his hands down on his brother’s shoulders. “Tys is right, stop worrying. We’ve got plenty. If not, someone can head out.”

The doorbell chimed through the house.

“I’ll get that,” Jamie said, rushing to get away from being admonished.

He opened the door to Paul Bissonnette -sunglasses firmly on, baseball cap low, smelling like the airport. Biz usually turned up for a few weeks every summer, up for the parties and the drinking and the lake swimming. He was always fun to have over, and Jamie liked hanging out with him, even if everything felt like fodder for a future podcast episode. But he certainly didn’t know that Biz was going to turn up now, here, at their house.

“Jamie Benn!” Biz boomed. He gave Jamie a thundering hug and backslap and then wheeled himself and his carry-on suitcase into the house.

“Nice place you got here.”

“You come here every year, Biz.”

“Oh right. Hey, every BC house kind of looks the same to me. You got the BBQ going? Look at all this booze. You got the nice stuff in, some cheap stuff, some craft beers.”

Jamie let the flood of Biz’s narrative wash over him. He was pretty sure he would be able to watch all of this happen again later on Instagram Stories.

“Why has he got his suitcase?” Jordie asked Jamie whilst Biz went to bellow hello to everyone else.

“I don’t know! Ask Tyson. I thought he was going to stay with him.”

Jordie rolled his eyes and headed back out to man the barbecue.

“And we’ve got Nathan Mackinnon!” Jamie heard Biz whoop. He sighed and headed into the kitchen to carry on counting the beers.

Jamie was on door duty. He welcomed everyone in, sent them towards the drinks and the food, and took the commiserations (about the season), congratulations (about the Art Ross trophy) and questions (where’s the booze?) as his old friends filed past him.

He opened the door around 9pm to Tyler with his arms in the air. It showed off a devastatingly small slither of naked skin just above his jeans.

“Jamie!”

“Wow. How drunk are you already?”

“I had a _few _drinks with the guys in town.”

“Are they here?” Jamie asked, praying to god they weren’t.

“No! This is a Benn brothers party. I need to focus on my Benns.”

It didn’t look like Tyler was going to be able to do a whole lot of focusing. He walked into the house, tripped on the entrance step, and crashed right into Jamie’s chest. Jamie froze.

“Whoa,” Tyler said, his mouth smashed into Jamie’s pecs. “You’re _solid_, Jamie. I always forget that. You’re like a mountain.”

“OK,” Jamie whispered, not trusted his voice to go any louder. “Let’s go inside. And maybe get you some water.”

He steered Tyler through the already busy living room and into the open plan kitchen area, where Tyson was pretending to be a bar tender.

“I can make you a margarita or a Sex on the Beach.”

“Sex on the Beach!” Tyler said, loud enough to make Nate and Tyson wince.

“Wow, someone’s been pre-drinking.”

Tyler rolled his eyes as Jamie tried to hand him a water instead. “I’m not that drunk, I’m just excited. My summer has officially started. Well, I still have to work at the diner, but I’ve only got day shifts and they don’t care if I turn up hungover. Let’s get it going.”

Which was how Jamie found himself doing shots with Tyler and Tyson at the kitchen island whilst Biz recorded the whole thing.

The only problem with this fun kind of drunk was that it all came crashing down on Jamie the minute things got quiet. Suddenly, in the bathroom, he felt tragically drunk and not happy about it.

He left the bathroom after someone started to pound on the door, and went to find a quiet room to gather his thoughts. He was suddenly, monumentally sad. He didn’t think this summer would be quite so bad. Yes he was fucked off with how their season ended. Like every other summer he’d taken the inevitable jabs at his captaincy to heart after bombing out of the playoffs. But he was only one guy. What else could he do?

And then there was Tyler. Every summer he was such a bright spark in Jamie’s year and yet…this year, he was such a bright spark that it almost hurt to be close to him. How many years had he pined? Surely he’d gone past the point of romantic and into the realm of creepy. He’d loved Tyler from the moment he first played street hockey with him aged 11. And yet he was in the exact same position now, some 15 years later.

He was a coward. That was the problem. He was a coward as a captain, a coward in hockey, a coward in romance. Jamie poured himself onto a couch in the second living area, which no-one had discovered yet, and moped to himself for a while. He shouldn’t have drunk this much then stopped so suddenly. It always made him morbid. 

He was interrupted half an hour later by Biz and Nate.

“Jordie said you’d gone missing. You OK?”

Jamie tried to raise a smile. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.”

“You don’t look it dude.”

Jamie sighed. Yeah, he was too drunk to pull this off.

“I just…nothing, it’s fine. I’m a bit too drunk, I think.”

“You need some water?”

“I’m fine.”

Biz disappeared and returned with a red cup filled to the brim with water.

“Drink that. Can’t have the Dallas Stars captain miserable on my watch.”

Jamie rolled his eyes and accepted the water. He drank it under their watchful eye.

“I’m fine guys, seriously.”

“You’ve been kind of looking down the whole night. What’s up?”

“Nothing, I swear. I’m all good.”

“Sucks you guys left the playoffs when you did. You should have got further.”

“Biz, I really don’t want to talk about that right now.”

“What is it about hockey guys and not wanting to talk about shit! I get it, we’re dudes, but seriously you’ve got to open up sometimes.”

Nate frowned at the back of Biz’s head. Since when did Biz say sensitive and sensible things like that? 

“It’s nothing to do with hockey.”

“Then something else. Love life got you down?”

“Always,” Jamie tried to joke. The joke fell flat.

“Go on then, what’s eating you about your love life? Aside the fact you don’t have one, and never have, and it’s starting to make people talk.”

“What?” Jamie squawked.

“Nothing. Carry on.”

“Who’s talking about my love life?”

Biz held up his hands. “Forget what I said. Tell me what’s wrong with your love life.”

Jamie let out possibly the longest and deepest sigh he’d ever managed to muster.

“It’s…complicated. Unrequited.”

“That’s a long word for a hockey player.”

“It means they don’t like him back,” Nate offered, trying to be helpful.

“I know what it fucking means, Mackinnon. Jesus, how stupid do you think I am? That was a joke, I’m trying to make misery guts here smile a bit. So who is this unrequited love directed at?”

“No-one,” Jamie said, waving a hand.

“It wouldn’t happen to be a certain guy so impressed with his own abs he’s going round offering body shots to anyone who looks at him?”

Jamie couldn’t stop his mouth open a little. “Tyler’s doing what?”

“Bingo. So it is Tyler.”

“Oh fuck,” Jamie groaned, realising he’d fallen into the trap.

“Look, it’s not hard to work out. Every year I’ve partied with you guys in the summer you’ve looked at him like he held up the fucking sun. I thought you just wanted to get into his pants but if it’s unrequited _love _we’re talking about…”

“We’re not talking about it,” Jamie said through gritted teeth. “We’re stopping right there.”

“Tyler’s at least a bit gay though, right? I mean, I’ve heard some of his stories. There’s both ends of the spectrum on his kill list.”

Jamie opened his mouth to say...something, that might have stopped Biz's speculation on sexuality, but Biz suddenly shouted like he'd had a lightbulb realisation. 

“Dude,” Biz said, grabbing Jamie’s face between the palms of his hands. “We can help. You can do it, this summer! We can, like, make a pact to get you and Tyler together.”

“Er…” Jamie said, face and mouth squashed by Biz’s huge hands.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll help.” Nate chimed in. “Love fucking sucks,” he added, with a venom that made both other men turn around and frown at him. “Sorry. I just meant, everyone needs help with it. It’s hard. And, er, yeah, I can help. We can help you do it, Jamie.”

Biz squeezed Jamie’s face even tighter. “By the end of the summer, I _promise _you that you and Tyler will be banging like two coconut shells in the wind.”

“Please don’t say that out loud. Ever again.”

“But why not? Dude, we can help. We’ll get Tyson on board. And Jordie-”

“No, no, not my brother.”

“Yeah ok, might be a bit weird if Jordie has to get his baby brother laid. But Tys and Mackinnon and I can help.”

Jamie must have been more drunk than he thought. Because that was the only reason to explain what he said next.

“Sure. Why not.”

Jamie regretted the decision almost instantly, but he had hosting to do and a lot of catching up with old friends. He only found Tyler a few hours later on the house’s dock that jutted out onto the lake. He was gathered with a small group and a big pile of beers, his bare feet in the water. He waved Jamie over and handed him a bottle.

“You remembered our dare from last year?” Tyler asked brightly.

Jamie lowered himself onto the deck alongside him and joined Tyler with his feet in the water. 

“What dare?”

“You know, the nicknames.”

No, Jamie had totally forgotten that. It was amazing that Tyler had remembered. It had been their last big party of the summer, they were all raging drunk, and they’d played a loose game of truth or dare. And Tyler and Jamie had ended up doing stupid dares as a pair, as there were simply too many people in the game. Their final dare was pretty tame and boring to everyone else but them: come up with the most disgusting nicknames for each other and call one another them. In public. The more ridiculous, the better. They’d spent the rest of the summer calling each other darling, sugar plum, baby-doll, sweetheart. But there had only been ten days left, so the list was short-lived.

“I had completely forgotten. We still doing that?”

“Of course. Buttercup.” Tyler winked at him.

“Buttercup? What am I? A cow?”

“Yeah,” Tyler teased. He lifted a hand and pinched Jamie’s chin. “You’ve got cow eyes.”

“I do not.”

“You do. Big cow eyes.”

Jamie let Tyler shake his head by his chin. Having Tyler’s hands on his face was a lot to deal with.

“Alright. I think you’ve had enough to drink.” Jamie snaffled the cup from Tyler’s free hand and downed it in one.

“Hey! Give it back!”

“Can’t now, drank it.”

Tyler launched himself as Jamie’s back and Jamie was too drunk to dodge it. They both tumbled together into the lake, fully clothed. When Jamie came up sputtering for air, the group around them clapping, he spotted Biz on the end of the dock. Tyler came flying out of the water next to him, soaked and spluttering. Biz stuck two thumbs up and grinned in their direction, his eyebrows dancing up and down. Jamie threw himself out of the water before Tyler could do anything else. He left Tyler in the lake looking at him with an expression he couldn’t read. He felt guilty, so mumbled something about having to get changed and disappeared.

Coward. Yep, he was a coward, he thought, as he squelched back towards the house.

* * *

2.

Jamie and Jordie were trying to find wasabi chips in the snack aisle of the grocery store when they bumped into Tyler and his Mom.

“Jamie, Jordie! How nice to see you, it’s been a while.”

She pushed the handle of the shopping cart into Tyler’s midriff and gave both boys a tight hug. Tyler rolled his eyes as Jackie started off on her yearly round of questions. How were their parents? And how was Jenny? Was it nice to be on holiday? What were their plans for the summer?

“Oh, you should come for dinner!”

Tyler opened his mouth to interrupt but Jackie was on a roll.

“Yes, that’s a great idea. Come over for dinner tonight, I’ll make you something special.”

“Errrr,” both Benn brothers said.

“No arguments, we’ll see you at seven,” Jackie said, wheeling the cart off in the direction of the fresh produce section. “I need to get some leafy greens to go with the roast. We’re having lamb. See you later boys.”

She disappeared round the corner of aisle 5 and left the three guys standing in a triangle looking at one another.

“Sorry about that,” Tyler said. He was wearing shorts, flip flops, and his Hunger Pines uniform shirt, which meant he’d just finished a shift. He looked tired and a little bit hungover.

“It’s fine. We can’t say no to a free meal. If that’s ok with you.”

“No, no, it’s fine with me. I just…didn’t want you to feel like you have to. It’s not like we’re kids anymore. But yeah, come over. It should be fun.”

Which was how Jordie and Jamie ended up on the Seguin’s summer home front door step, dressed smartly and carrying a bottle of wine.

“Stop fiddling with your shirt,” Jordie told his brother as they waited for someone to answer the doorbell.

“It’s too small for me this summer.”

“Believe me, Tyler isn’t going to care that you’re hulking out of all your shirts this year.”

“Shut up. And I don’t care what Tyler thinks, I don’t want to bust out of this in front of his Mom.”

The door opening stopped their conversation in its tracks. A trio of excited labradors flew out at them, then Tyler.

“You’re here,” Tyler said. He sounded…flat.

“Yeah sorry, we’re a bit early. Is that ok?”

“No, no, it’s totally fine. It’s just…” Tyler pulled the door slightly closed behind him. “Dean is here. I didn’t think he was going to be.”

Dean was Jackie Seguin’s boyfriend. Tyler always referred to him as ‘Mom’s new boyfriend’, despite the fact they’d been together for about 5 years now. It was one of many signs that Tyler wasn’t exactly happy with the arrangement.

Jamie didn’t pretend to know what Tyler went through when his parents divorced when he was about fourteen. But he remembered the summer it happened, and Tyler had been hard work to be around. One minute he was happy and bright, his usual self. Then the next minute he was moody and quick to fall out with someone. It was the one and only time he and Tyler had had a proper argument. It was over something stupid, during a game of street hockey, but Tyler had broken a stick and stormed off. Jordie had tried to go after him to smooth things over, but Tyler had called him something nasty and told him to leave him the hell alone. The Benn brothers didn’t see him again until a party organised by a mutual friend, and Tyler turned up pretending nothing had happened. He’d apologised to them the next day, after avoiding them for the whole party. It was only a few days later that Jamie’s Mom had told the boys that Jackie Seguin had left her husband back in Toronto that summer for a reason. By the time the next summer came around, Tyler was full of stories about staying with his Dad, how his Dad was awesome and he might go and live with him full time. Two weeks later he was back to not mentioning his Dad at all, and actively avoiding all topics of conversation that involved him. Jamie guessed things were complicated. He knew Tyler adored his Dad, but that Mr Seguin was trying his best to be the fun weekend Dad. And that as Tyler got older, it got a lot less fun.

So Jamie entered the dining room of the Seguin household fully expecting a difficult night ahead.

Dean stood up from the table and shook their hands. They’d bumped into each other enough summers to already know one another, so the formal introduction made everything more awkward. He asked them some hockey questions until Tyler interrupted that the guys wouldn’t want to talk about it during the off season, which shut the whole conversation down. A stilted pause reigned until Jackie came in with some drinks.

Jamie drank his first glass of wine a bit too quickly, but accepted the refill without argument. Jackie steered the conversation to more neutral ground, whilst Tyler plucked grumpily at the food.

“I’m guessing you guys didn’t go to college?” Dean asked, apropos of nothing as the main dish was passed out. Tyler let out a sigh so violent it was hard to pretend not to notice it.

“Erm, no. Neither of us,” Jordie answered quickly. “Straight into hockey after high school.”

“Because Tyler here keeps going on about how he needs some fancy college education and I keep telling him, he doesn’t.”

“Dean, not now.”

“I just wondered what these two think, Jackie. They didn’t go to college, and they’ve done well for themselves.”

“_These two_,” Tyler hissed, his voice acidic. “Are professional hockey players. They didn’t need to go to college. I’m not a professional hockey player.”

“No, well maybe if you hadn’t hurt your knee all those years ago you’d have that option too.”

Tyler nearly dropped the salad bowl he’d been holding. The table fell into an icy, all-consuming silence.

“I need more wine,” Tyler said, finally. He banged the salad bowl down onto the table, scraped back his chair loudly and left for the kitchen. Jackie glared down the table at her boyfriend.

“What? Are we still not allowed to talk about it? It was years ago.”

Jamie and Jordie exchanged an uncomfortable glance.

It was a long few minutes before Tyler got back from the kitchen, brandishing a new bottle of red wine like a weapon. He poured himself a glass up to the rim then drank it in three aggressive gulps, and poured some more. He didn’t offer it to anyone else.

“So you think it’s a total waste of time for me to go to college then?” Tyler asked. Jamie lowered his eyes to his plate. He knew how Tyler behaved when he got like this. For the most part Tyler was easy going, disliked the heavy conversations, and preferred to move on when something difficult had to be discussed. He liked everyone to be happy, and he was eager to please, almost to a fault. But when he was fucked off enough he could poke at a nasty topic of conversation like prodding an old bruise.

“Not totally. I just think you need to have a real reason to go. And a good focus. You’ve not got the best focus, Tyler.”

Jamie was sure Jackie was about to set her boyfriend on fire with her glare alone.

“What the hell does _focus _mean?” Tyler asked.

“If I have to explain it to you, then you don’t have it.”

“I need to go to college to do the job I want to do.”

“And what job is this? The thing you apparently want to do so badly, but you won’t talk to your Mom or me about?”

“Why would I talk to _you_ about it?”

“Fine, just your Mom then. Even she says you won’t say what it is.”

“I won’t say what it is yet because I haven’t even tried to get there yet. I want to see if it’s possible. And if I go to college, it might be.”

“Why can’t you just work? What’s wrong with a hard day’s work?”

“Nothing! But I’m sick of coming here every summer and working at a diner, and the rest of the year just scraping by on random jobs. I want to do more than that.”

“You don’t come from enough money to be a snob about hard work, Tyler. You’ve got to just get on with it, like the rest of us. Don’t put your poor Mom through all that financial stress just because you’ve got airs and graces about going to college.”

Tyler scraped his knife so hard against the plate that the whole table winced.

“Airs and graces?”

“Unless you’re going to be a doctor or a lawyer, people only go to college because they’re afraid of starting work like the rest of us. They just want an expensive way to shirk it for three years.”

Tyler narrowed his eyes. He was furious, Jamie could tell, but he was just about managing to keep from outright shouting.

“That’s not true.”

“Believe me Tyler, when you get to my age you’ll see it. Your generation just want all the finer things in life without having work for it.”

“You don’t even know what I want to work for!”

“No, but it’s only going to be about as good as that communications course you tried two years ago. And how did that go? It was hard work, and look what happened. You don’t have a communications degree now do you?”

Jamie heard Jordie swallow loudly next to him.

“Jesus, you are such a prick sometimes!”

“Tyler,” Jackie snapped.

“No, seriously Mom, what the hell has me going to college got to do with him?”

“Nothing sweetheart, but he just wants to help.”

“I don’t want his fucking help!”

“Don’t swear Tyler.”

“Mom, why do you always defend him?”

“We’ve got guests,” she said to him, low and warning.

“It’s Jamie and Jordie, they already know what a dick Dean is. And, apparently, what a dropout loser I am. What do they care?”

Another long silence fell over the table. Jamie stared at the joint of lamb in front of them, not daring to look up. He felt heat radiating off his brother as he went unmistakably red with embarrassment. 

Tyler eventually stood up from the table and his chair hit the floor with a bang. “I’m going to get the dessert.”

He left again and the four remaining at the table sat in a silence so awkward it made Jamie’s skin crawl.

“It was a really nice dinner, Mrs Seguin,” Jordie said eventually.

“Oh Jordie, you know you don’t have to call me that anymore.”

“Sorry. Jackie.”

“Excuse me,” Jamie said, standing up. “I need to go to the bathroom.”

He felt more than saw the glare his brother was giving him, but Jamie couldn’t take the frostiness at the table anymore. And he felt obliged to go and see if Tyler was alright.

He found Tyler sitting on the back step with his new puppy Gerry cuddled up between his legs.

“You OK?”

“No,” Tyler grumbled. Jamie lowered himself onto the step next to him. “Sorry. I know that was awkward. He just makes me so mad. He wasn’t even supposed to be here most of this summer. He had this job he had to do on an oil field in Edmonton. But then he just turns up ‘as a surprise’ for Mom. And whenever he’s here he just has to get involved in _everything_. We get on fine without him, but he just likes to meddle.”

Jamie nodded. He figured it was best to just let Tyler talk. There wasn’t a whole lot he could do to help. He didn’t have any experience of step-Dads.

Tyler looked up at him and Jamie was alarmed to see his eyes were red and damp.

“You know what I want to go to college for?”

“What?”

“I want to be an athletic trainer. Or a sports therapist, that kind of thing.”

“Wow, that’s cool. You’d be good at that, Tyler.”

Tyler gave him a small smile. “Really?”

“Yeah. ‘Course you would. You’re smart, and you know a lot about it. When we’ve talked about nutrition and my workouts and stuff, you always seem to say the same things as my trainers. You’re natural at it.”

Tyler’s smile got warmer. “Thanks, Jamie.”

“You really haven’t told even your Mom?”

“No. I’m worried about saying anything, in case it all comes crashing down. I don’t want to fail at something again.”

“Then why did you just tell me?”

Tyler’s smile flashed brighter for a moment. “You’re the best person to tell things to, Jamie. No matter what I do, you always say the right thing. You’re a good friend.”

Jamie grinned back at him. In that moment he realised, no matter how sad it made him, he couldn’t give this up, his friendship with Tyler. And if that meant never saying how he felt, then so be it. He was a good friend, after all.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have given communications up,” Tyler said, pulling Jamie out of his thoughts.

“Sometimes you’ve got to try stuff out before you know what you’re going to do. Look at me, I played baseball for years. And when I chose hockey, but I got drafted so low down, I thought maybe I’d made the wrong decision. What if I’d given up baseball, and I could have been a great baseball player much easier than a hockey player? But I got where I wanted to, in the end, even though it was the hard way and no-one thought I would. Because I knew deep down I’d made the best decision for me. You knew you were doing the best thing for you, right?”

Tyler blinked and then wiped quickly at his face, trying to hide the tear that had fallen. “Yeah. Totally. It wasn’t for me.”

“Exactly. You’ve got to trust that sometimes you try things and fail for a reason. It’s because what you’re going to do next is what you really need to be doing.”

“Thanks Jamie.”

“No problem. It’s true. If you want to go to college and study physical therapy, you should do it.” He nudged Tyler in the ribs with his elbow. “Come and work for the Dallas Stars.”

“Oh yeah, can you imagine? All that heat, and country music, and steak. Mixing with the rednecks.”

Jamie rolled his eyes. “Yeah yeah, that’s all Dallas is.”

“All so I can run out on the ice and make sure you and your teammates aren’t concussed. And monitor how much ice cream you eat.”

“Hey, there’s more to it than that.”

“Oh yeah. There’s all those massages I’d have to give you,” Tyler said, with a wink. 

Which was…wow. Yeah, Jamie hadn’t even thought about that. Even in this fantasy world they’d created, it was way too much to think of Tyler being required to give him a massage at the end of a game. Suddenly Jamie’s jeans were getting a bit tight.

Jordie came to the rescue. “Guys,” he snapped, appearing behind them looking none too happy. “I’ve been sent to check Jamie hadn’t fallen down the toilet.”

“Sorry. We’re coming. I’d better get the dessert like I promised.”

Jamie and Tyler stood up, and Tyler rushed off to take the pie out of the oven. Jordie trailed after him but shot Jamie a dirty look over his shoulder.

“What?”

“I can’t believe you left me in there.”

“He was upset!”

Jordie nodded pointedly toward Jamie’s crotch. “Well I don’t know what you were talking about but maybe you give it a minute before you come back in.”

“Fuck off,” Jamie hissed, giving his brother a shove in the back.

The rest of the dinner party was a little awkward, but was helped by Dean getting an emergency work call and having to leave at the beginning of dessert. When he came back Tyler loudly called Jamie ‘Snuggie wuggums’ for handing him the cream, which made the boys dissolve into childish giggles. Jackie left them to it, and dragged Dean away before he could ask what the hell that was about.

* * *

3.

A breeze had picked up over the lake, rushing a needling chill onto the deck. The guys had got the fire pit going but it was more for show than for warmth. Jordie was still stripped to his swimming trunks as he manned the BBQ, tongues in one hand and beer in the other.

Jamie was feeling…content. He’d done a workout that morning and felt tired to his bones. It was a feeling he could enjoy in the off season. The minute October rolled around the feeling would get old, and it just meant more of the same was coming the next day, and the day after that, and for months ahead.

Tyson was telling some embarrassing story about a team dinner and a teammate - who he refused to identify but Jamie strongly suspected was Mikko Rantanen going by Tyson’s impressions - getting drunk and falling over the edge of an outdoor terrace into a bush, and having to be rescued by his ankles. Nate interjected every now and then, laughing so hard he almost dislodged his new best friend Juice from his lap. Biz had arrived earlier in the evening to nurse a hangover from another party the night before, and was snoring loudly on the outdoor couch they were all sprawled on.

Jamie felt the seat next to him dip as Tyler sat down on his right. He had some fresh bottles of beer in his hand.

“Hey,” Tyler whispered, so as not to interrupt the part of Tyson’s story where his teammate’s foot got stuck in a balcony railing.

“Hey.”

Jamie lifted the edge of the blanket he had loosely over his lap and Tyler took it gratefully. He passed over a cold bottle in exchange.

Tyler’s skin was chilly where it was pressed against Jamie’s thigh and arm. He wriggled a little, burrowing deeper against Jamie and into the blanket.

“You cold?”

“No, all good. Thanks, Honey Bear.”

Jamie scoffed into his newly opened beer. “Oh that’s a good one.”

“I googled it. I’ve got a whole list to work through.”

Jamie laughed softly, and fondly. “That’s a lot of effort for a game of dare.”

“Hey I take my dares seriously. Where are you getting your ideas from?”

My heart, Jamie nearly said. So he smashed the beer into his mouth forcefully enough he nearly knocked his teeth out.

“Wow, are you OK?”

“Yeah, yeah, just, er, missed my mouth.”

Tyler smiled slyly at Jamie. He looked so beautiful tonight, hair standing on end from his afternoon lazing in the lake, nose and shoulders pink from the sun, and the firelight lighting him up in a soft glow. He looked particularly gorgeous when he smiled like this, mischievous and private.

“You’re a funny one, Jamie Benn.”

Jordie broke the moment by lowering a plate groaning with meat in between the two of them.

“Burgers, dogs, ribs, pick your poison.”

Tyler and Jamie loaded up their plates and cracked open more beers.

“Someone wake up Biz, maybe if he eats some of this he’ll come back to life.”

By the time they’d finished all the meat and made a dent in the beers, Jamie was feeling bloated and guilty for deviating from his summer meal plan. But he also didn’t care. With Tyler pressed up against his side and his friends around him, and the stars rolled out in a canopy above them, there was very little he really cared about.

“I’m too hot,” Jordie announced after finishing his meal. “Why am I the one always doing the cooking?”

“Because every year we offer and every year you say we all do a shit job of it. You’re a barbecue control freak.”

“Whatever. I’m off for a dip in the lake. Anyone coming?”

They all put down their dirty plates and empties to sort out later and let themselves through the guard gate and onto the dock. It stuck out into the lake a respectable distance just like the neighbouring houses around it. Most docks had boats tied up, but the Benns weren’t a big fishing family.

“Let’s go. Let’s go!”

Biz thundered past them, stark bollock naked. He howled at the moon and cannonballed off the end of the dock.

“I blame you for him,” Jamie said to Tyson as he stripped off his shirt.

“Yeah, yeah, you’re not the first person who has said that to me.”

The group threw themselves into the black water one by one, leaving Juice to bark at them from the dry safety of the dock.

Jamie swam down as far as he could, until his lungs hurt and there was only darkness, then kicked up and reared up out of the water for a gasp of oxygen to his lungs. Every year he forgot how much he missed this. Every year the realisation was just as beautiful.

Tyler was in front of him, treading water in the dim light of the moon.

“You’ve got something in your hair.”

He leant forward and plucked some greenery from Jamie’s hair, which had flopped over in a soggy mess. 

“Thanks, dumpling.”

“Dumpling! That’s weak, Jamie.”

“It’s not weak! It’s a cutesy nickname. It’s sickening.”

“My grandma calls me dumpling. It’s hardly a couple’s pet name.”

‘We’re not a couple’ Jamie almost rebuffed, but he couldn’t bring himself to say that even in jest.

“Fine. Cutie patootie.”

Tyler pretended to think about it for a while. “OK. I’ll accept cutie patootie. That’s a good one. That’s above Honey-bear.”

Jamie splashed him with water then ducked under the surface to avoid retaliation.

When he came up, he realised he and Tyler were alone. And if the furtive looks in their direction was anything to go by, Biz and Nate had engineered it.

Jamie and Tyler treaded water in silence together for a while. Tyler was looking at him contemplatively over the water.

“What?”

“Nothing. It’s just…how long have we known each other?”

“I think I was twelve when we met, right? So fifteen years.”

Tyler hummed thoughtfully.

“Why?”

“Nothing. Just thinking.”

They’d bobbed closer to one another. Jamie could feel the ghost of Tyler’s feet pushing water against his own shins.

“Fifteen years. You haven’t got rid of me yet.”

“I’d never get rid of you.”

Jamie could have sworn he felt Tyler’s fingers trail across his arm under the water. They were so close now that Jamie could see the drops of water lit up by the moonlight in Tyler’s eyelashes.

Then the brightest light hit Jamie direct in the eyeballs.

“Fuck!” he cried, clapping his hands over his eyes.

“Shit, fuck, what the hell?!” Tyler howled. It was so bright Jamie had to duck beneath the water surface. Even down there everything was lit up like the sun had been switched back on. 

“Sorry boys!” a voice came down to them. It was a boat, with a floodlight hooked off of the back. And suddenly Jamie knew exactly who it was.

“Jamie Benn, is that you?”

“Jim, what the hell?!”

“Sorry about that. We were doing some night fishing.”

Jamie sputtered and squinted up through the searching light to the boat. Their neighbour Jim Worthy leant over the side and waved.

“Night fishing? What the fuck?”

“Sorry Jamie, didn’t know you were here tonight.”

“Hi Jim!” Jordie’s voice came from over at the dock.

“Oh hi Jordie! How are you now?”

“Not so bad, and you?”

“All good thank you. Got two prime specimens here.”

He prodded at Jamie and Tyler with the butt of his spear.

“I’d throw them overboard. Not worth it," Jordie called back. 

Tyler kicked off from the boat and headed back to the dock. And just like that, the moment was ruined. Jamie sighed and followed after him. 

“Sorry boys!” His neighbour shouted after him. Jamie waved a hand half-heartedly in his direction.

* * *

4.

They were having another party at Jamie and Jordie’s, because Tyson’s Dad was in town for some golf competition he had provided the prize money for. The Benn's house had been used the last few days for a relaxed time with their sister and their new niece, and it was nice to have a change from the drinking and the partying. But they’d promised their house as a party venue, and Biz was still around and eager to squeeze as much fun out of his time in BC as possible. He goaded them into hosting another one, on the promise it would be low key and simple. Everyone was buzzed but not wild, and Jamie found himself a little tipsy in the kitchen when he spotted Nate in the corridor. He was hanging around on his own, staring at his phone. He looked miserable.

“Hey,” Jamie said, sliding out of the kitchen and towards the Colorado centerman. “You OK, Nate?”

Jamie had known Nate tangentially through Tyson for years. He was one of Tyson’s best friends, and Tyson Barrie was the kind of guy who liked everyone but loved selectively. If Tyson was close to Nate, that meant he was the sort of person Jamie would like too. They’d had sporadic summer experiences together all throughout Tyson’s career at Colorado. Jamie distinctly remembered Tyson bringing a much younger, skinnier, and spottier Nathan Mackinnon along for his first summer of offseason revelry. He was younger than the rest of them but had no problem keeping up. He ragged on Tyson as much as the rest of them and, well, that made anyone part of the group.

But there was no reason for Nate to have been in BC for the three weeks he’d been there so far. And Jamie had no idea where to even start guessing as to why.

“I’m fine,” Nate said automatically as Jamie sidled up to him.

“You sure? You’re out here on your own. You missed Tyson downing a margarita.”

Nate scoffed. “I’ve seen Tyson get sloppy drunk enough to last me a lifetime.”

They stood in the corridor together in silence for a moment. It wasn’t awkward. Jamie had figured long ago that Nate was like him: a man of few words.

“I’m kind of having a dilemma,” Nate said eventually, gesturing towards his phone.

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. And I don’t know how to deal with it.”

“Well, you don’t have to tell me what it is. But can I help?”

Nathan sighed. “I don’t know, man. I don’t think anyone can. I’ve just got wait and see.” He rubbed at the back of his neck. “I’m just worried…I could have ruined the team.”

“Nate, I doubt there’s anything you could have done to ruin your team. Especially in the offseason.”

Nate shrugged. “Well, might as well tell you. You’ve been nice enough to have me for these last few weeks. And you’re a captain. Could do with a captain’s perspective.”

“OK. What is it?”

Nate didn’t look up as he talked, choosing instead to fiddle with his phone. “You know Erik Johnson?”

“He’s the one always standing in my way when I want to score on your goalie.”

“Ha, yeah. Well for a while now, I’ve kind of…been having some feelings for him.”

Jamie’s eyebrows shot up his head. He couldn’t help it. Whatever problem Nate had been having, he hadn’t guessed this.

“Wow. For how long?”

“Like a year. And it wasn’t going away. I thought it would, but it just got worse.”

“So what happened?”

“I told EJ how I felt about him.”

Jamie winced.

“Yeah.”

“I guess it didn’t go well?”

“No offence to Tyson and you guys, but if it went well I wouldn’t be over here for this long.” Nate sighed and rubbed at his forehead. “The longer I stayed at home the more I turned it over and over in my head. I needed to get away for a bit.”

“You talked to Sid about it?”

“No, no. God. I mean, he would be fine about it, about the gay thing, but he would have picked the whole thing apart. And probably made me do a fucking pros and cons list or something. When I told Erik…it wasn’t a proper _decision_, it wasn’t like I thought about it. I just said it. It was the end of season dinner and I was feeling sad about not seeing everyone all summer and I just blurted it out. Which was stupid, I know, but it just came out of me. I didn’t even know I was saying it until I saw his face. So I couldn’t tell Sid about it afterwards, either. Telling him would just make my stupidity even worse.”

Jamie knew what that felt like. He loved his brother, and told him everything. But it would take a lot of bravery to admit to him that he’d just spilled his heart to someone he liked and been soundly rejected.

“So he said no.”

“Worse. He didn’t say anything. He just looked at me, for ages, not saying anything. I’ve never seen him look like that at anyone before. It was…fuck, it was like he just went blank. And then he said he had to go. And he didn’t just leave the conversation, he left totally. I saw Gabe trying to talk to him in the driveway but he just got in his car and left. I heard from Tyson that he flew home the next day, even though he was supposed to go like two days later. He just went early, didn’t say anything to anyone.”

Jamie blew out a long sigh. “Shit. I’m sorry, Nate.”

“I’m just worried I’ve fucked everything up.” Nate’s voice had gone tight. “Not just with Erik, but with everyone. What if we can’t talk to each other anymore? What if he can’t even be in a room with me? And I’ve ruined the team?

That was a difficult one. Jamie couldn’t pretend it wasn’t hard when there was something wrong between two team members. The closer the people involved the worse it was. He still remembered the two weeks when his brother and Jason Demers weren’t speaking to each other. It had been _weird_, and frankly insufferable. But there wasn’t much he could do about except act like nothing was wrong and set an example for the rest of the team. And he’d been beyond thankful when they’d worked it out between them and could finally get along again.

“You won’t have ruined the team. It might take time, but you’ll sort it out. I’m sure you will.”

Nate shrugged. He looked more miserable now than he had when they’d tarted talking.

“Has he talked to anyone else about it?”

“Tyson hasn’t heard from him. We both get the feeling he talked to Gabe about it, but I can’t get a read on what Gabe thinks. He’s too Swedish.”

“Well, maybe you need to reach out to him. He’s your captain. Ask him what you think you should do.”

“Yeah. Maybe.”

Jamie nudged him with his elbow. “So this is why you promised to help me because ‘love sucks’”

“Yeah. Exactly. It’s the worst.”

“At least you were brave enough to put it out there, Nate. You’re braver than me.”

“Or more stupid.”

Jamie tried his best to give sage captain-like advice. He wasn’t sure it helped. The conversation ended with an awkward hug/back slap thing that went on a bit too long, then they went their separate ways into the party. Jamie felt bad for Nate, he really did. Whatever happened with Tyler, at least he didn’t have sharing a team to complicate matters.

“Hey Snicker Doodle!” Tyler cried, jumping out at him from behind the fridge whilst Jamie was retrieving a beer.

“Hey Lamb Chop.”

“Lamb Chop? Are you serious?”

“I looked it up!”

“No-one has ever called anyone ‘lamb chop’ as a nickname ever. Think of something better.”

Jamie rolled his eyes affectionately. “What are you drinking?”

“I dunno, some punch stuff someone brought. Kind of fruity.”

“OK, I’m going to stick to a beer.”

The area around the fridge was the only part of the house with much space to breathe. Tyler fanned himself with his hand. “This house is full. I’m so hot.”

“There were a few more people than I thought.”

“You offering food?”

“Someone’s gone out to get pizzas.”

Tyson moseyed into the kitchen with Nate in tow, looking for more alcohol.

“What are you two up to?” Tyson asked, turning his head to waggle his eyebrows suggestively at Jamie so Tyler couldn’t see.

“_Nothing_. I’m watching what you’re taking by the way. Drink the beer you brought!”

“Fuck off, like you and Jordie haven’t been drinking my beer and eating my food every summer.”

“Is anyone else really hot?” Tyler piped up, in the middle of their arguing.

Tyson turned around and balked in surprise. “Whoa, Tyler, you’re really red.”

Jamie whipped around to look as well and, yeah, Tyler was bright red in the face.

“My throat feels weird,” Tyler said, lifting his hand to wring at the skin around his neck.

“It’s seriously red. Are you OK?”

Tyler looked down at the cup in his hand.

“What’s in that punch stuff, from the bowl?”

“I don’t know. Why?”

“My mouth feels weird,” Tyler said. He stuck his tongue out and smacked his lips. “It tastes like metal.”

“Why do you need to know what’s in the punch?”

“Because I’m kind of allergic to pineapples.”

“_Kind of_?”

Tyson snatched the cup from Tyler’s hand and took a swig.

“Yeah, that tastes like it’s got pineapple in it.”

“Your neck is getting redder,” Nate warned. Red welts had started flushing to life across the base of Tyler’s throat.

“Shit. My throat hurts.”

“Do you need to take something? Do you have an epipen thing?”

Tyler winced. “I should do.”

“Jesus Tyler,” Jamie said, finally feeling his brain snap into life. “Why don’t you have one on you?”

“I just don’t eat pineapple! It’s not a hard thing to miss. And I’ve not had it this bad before, I thought I just got a bit sick and itchy but this is…yeah, I really don’t feel well.”

Nate stepped forward and pushed Tyler down onto a chair.

“It’s fine, we’ll just take you to the ER. Sit down, don’t panic or anything.”

Jamie wished someone would tell him not to panic. Tyler was staring at his hands in horror - the hives had started to appear there as well. Tyson rushed to get Tyler some water.

“Who’s sober enough to drive?” Jamie asked. “‘Cos I’m definitely not.”

“I think I’m fine,” Nate said, “I’ve only had a few. But it’d be better if there was someone properly sober.”

Absolutely no-one guessed it would be Biz that came to the rescue.

“I heard you need a designated driver,” he said, appearing in the kitchen. It was hard to tell with Biz when he was drunk or sober, so Jamie was suspicious.

“Are you sure you’ve not had anything to drink?”

“Hey, sometimes I like to remember a whole night. I’ve been hitting it hard since Vegas, I figured I’d need a night off. Why do you need someone to drive?”

Nate pushed him in front of Tyler.

“_Jesus. _Seggy, what happened to you?”

“I drank pineapple,” Tyler said, swallowing heavily with the effort.

“Don’t talk,” Nate admonished. Tyson had found an ice pack from the freezer and was pressing it against Tyler’s throat. And Jamie…Jamie felt absolutely frozen in place in panic.

“Are you allergic? Where’s your epipen thing?”

“He doesn’t have one.”

“My god, and I thought hockey players were fucking idiots. Let’s go then, hurry up before you die on us. I’ll grab my keys.”

Jamie helped Tyler get to his feet and steered him through the crowd. No-one seemed to notice he was half carrying him by the time they got to the front door. It was a good job he was always training, because Tyler was heavy and slowly sliding down his side, one hand clenched in the back of Jamie’s shirt. Tyson and Nate fussed behind them, unsure how to help.

“Find Jordie and tell him what’s going on. We might be a while,” Jamie told Tyson, to give them something to do. The pair nodded and watched the trio head to Biz’s car, mercifully parked on the street and not blocked in by everyone else’s. The slap of chilly evening air helped to wake Jamie up. The music fell away and the buzz of people partying echoed in his ears, reminding him that he was definitely not sober enough to deal with this.

Jamie hauled Tyler into the back seat and Biz hit the gas.

“You know the way?”

“I’ve visited Victoria every summer to party ever since I was twenty years old, Jamie. I know exactly where the closest hospital is.”

Tyler had folded himself over in the back so that his forehead was pressed into the cool leather headrest of the driver’s seat. He wasn’t breathing heavily, but Jamie could feel the quick press of his chest expanding under his hand as he rubbed comforting circles.

“Just relax, we won’t be long. You OK?”

Tyler shook his head.

“Hurry up Biz.”

“I’m going as fast as I can! If we get pulled over for speeding this is going to go a hell of a lot slower.”

Jamie knew it wasn’t far from their house to the ER, but it felt like an eternity. By the time Biz slapped on the brakes and delivered them outside the doors he could have sworn Tyler was unconscious. Thankfully he managed to get him awake enough to get out of the car, and the pair of them staggered in through the sliding doors as Biz peeled off to find a parking space.

Tyler nearly slid through Jamie’s fingers as they entered the cool wash of the air conditioned ER triage area.

“Tyler, you alright?”

Tyler shook his head, frantic this time. Jamie looked up to yell for some help but a nurse was already there.

“What’s happened here?”

“He’s allergic to pineapple and drank some juice. He doesn’t have his epipen.”

The nurse calmly called for more help on the desk phone and Tyler was wheeled off with Jamie in tow to act as his voice: how much had he had to drink? Has he had an attack before? When was the last time he used an epipen? Does he have any other allergies?

Jamie felt pretty useless at answering most of those questions. But he understood Tyler’s squeezes to his hand and little nods and gasps. Biz turned up just as Tyler was getting a shot, went pale and then excused himself to wait in the hallway. If Jamie had the headspace, he’d have laughed.

The nurse chatted away to them the whole time, easy and bright in a room full of two anxious young men gripping onto each other for dear life. As the panic started to subside, Tyler’s throat lost his redness and the hives eased, and more importantly his breathing started to regulate, Jamie began to feel solid for the first time in the last hour. He’d always thought he was ok in a medical emergency, but he now realised that was because he’d encountered them during a hockey game. It wasn’t hard to be calm in a situation in which trained professionals were in control within seconds.

Plus, he had a distinct memory of Jordie falling out of a treehouse aged 10 and fracturing his arm - his parents had been alerted by Jamie’s wails that his brother was going to die, and found Jordie holding his wrist and shouting at Jamie to shut up and stop screaming. Nope, he really wasn’t as calm in an emergency as he hoped.

“You can relax now,” the nurse- Ellie, her name badge said - told Jamie conspiratorially, as Tyler sipped at something sweet and medical out of a plastic cup. She tapped at Jamie’s hand where it clenched the hospital bed rail so hard he was surprised it hadn’t buckled. “I don’t want to be dealing with a dislocated finger.”

“Oh, sorry,” Jamie said, removing his hand from the rail and wiping his sweaty palm on his shirt.

“Right, Tyler, how are you feeling?” Nurse Ellie asked Tyler. He pulled a face as he finished off the cup of medicine.

“This is gross. But I’m feeling better.”

“Any itchiness?”

“Just at the back of my throat, and I can breathe fine now. My neck isn’t as sore.”

“We caught it just in time. You’re lucky you had your friends around you to drive you to the hospital. I’ll send the doctor over when he’s got a minute to check you out, but you seem to be making a nice recovery. And once the doctor has written your prescription for a new epipen I’m going to give you a tutorial in how to use it. And I’ll assume this is enough of a lesson in making sure you carry it with you at all times?”

“Don’t worry, it is,” Tyler said sheepishly.

“And when I tell his Mom she’s going to yell at him for the rest of the summer. He’ll never do it again,” Jamie assured the nurse. She laughed and squeezed Tyler’s wrist.

“Well good luck with that. I’ll see you later, Tyler. The doctor shouldn’t be long.”

Tyler groaned into his palms as she left.

“Oh god, my Mom is going to find out. You’re not going to tell her are you?”

“If you don’t, I will. That was really stupid, Tyler. Why don’t you keep an epipen on you if you need it?”

“Because I’ve eaten pineapple by mistake only once before, and it wasn’t that bad. I felt sick and itchy and I took some allergy tablets and I felt fine. I didn’t realise it was _this _bad.”

Jamie peeled Tyler’s hands off his face, careful not to jostle the blood pressure monitor on his finger or the IV in the back of his hand.

“I promise not to tell her tonight, ok? But you’ve got to let her know.”

“Yeah, I know. She’s going to _kill _me.”

“Yeah, she is,” Jamie chuckled. He still had Tyler’s hands in his.

Jamie was a hockey player, and big hands were kind of a normal part of a hockey player’s anatomy, so he was used them. But Tyler’s…they were huge, with long fingers striated with a surprising amount of muscle, the wrists tickled by the end of his tattoo sleeves. There were a lot of parts of Tyler that Jamie was amazed at. His big Cheshire cat grin. His eyes with their quick-to-mischevious looks. His abs, which…well, Jamie didn’t want to get started on the ode to Tyler’s abs he’d written in his head in the past. But his hands were up there too, and they felt special to Jamie. He’d watched them so often, gesturing during stories or flexing on a can of beer, flying around as he danced - Jamie was surprised no-one had noticed him gawping.

It had been a long, long moment that he’d been looking at them now. He tore his eyes away from them, up to Tyler’s face. Tyler was looking right at him. His mouth parted slightly - to say something, to tell Jamie to get the hell off his hands, to tell him he loved him…Jamie would never know, because the Doctor opened the door at that exact moment. He threw Tyler’s hands down like they were on fire, flung himself away from the bed, caught his foot in the visitor’s chair and cartwheeled backwards onto the floor. His head went smack against the hospital linoleum and everything went a bit fuzzy.

“So let me get this straight,” Biz said, cranking his engine over and pointing his SUV back towards the Benn’s holiday home. “We bring Tyler to the hospital having some sort of life or death emergency. And we leave with Tyler totally fine, and you, Jamie Benn, with a concussion?”

“Shut up,” Jamie groused. “They didn’t say I had a concussion.”

“They said a possible concussion, and only because they weren’t sure if it was your head or the drink.”

“I’m _fine._”

“You’re going to have an impressive egg on the back of your head.”

“Shut up Biz, seriously.”

Jamie looked across the back seat at Tyler who was muffling his laughter behind his hand. It had a band-aid over the back where the nurse had removed the IV. Tyler being unhooked from the machinery and discharged had all happened during the time Jamie was being propped upright and asked a lot of questions he remembered from the NHL concussion protocol.

“What even happened?”

“Nothing! It was nothing.”

“Come on, I need the full story for the podcast.”

“No, no, no way. This is going nowhere near Spittin’ Chiclets, Biz, or I swear to god I’ll sue you.”

“Doctor patient confidentiality,” Tyler claimed, finally coming to Jamie’s rescue.

“Confidentiality my ass. The nurse told me you did a backflip over the chair and smacked your head on the floor for no reason.”

“Fuck off.”

Jordie was confused when the trio pulled up in their driveway.

“What happened to you?” he asked, watching Jamie gingerly get out of the car with an ice pack on the back of his head.

“Nothing, I’m _fine_.”

“Did Biz crash you guys on the way there?”

“Hey, this had nothing to do with me. Apparently Jamie decided to try and do gymnastics in the hospital room and got tangled up in a chair.”

Jordie raised his eyebrow at his younger brother, who waved the question away with a hand.

“It was nothing. I slipped and fell in the ER, that’s all.”

Jordie pulled Tyler under his arm and squeezed him round the shoulders. “You OK then Segs?”

“Yeah I’m fine, thanks Jordie.”

“Sorry about the fruit punch. I don’t even know who brought it.”

“No worries. I guess I’ve never told anyone I can’t eat pineapple.”

“Never do that again, Tyler. You scared the crap out of me.”

Jordie held out his other arm and snagged Jamie too. It was difficult to fit under his brother’s arm these days, and he pretended not to enjoy it, but hey, sometimes a bit of brotherly comfort was nice.

“Do I have to watch you all night and make sure you don’t die from a concussion?”

“Might be a good idea,” Jamie mumbled into Jordie’s shoulder. Jordie sighed.

“OK. Come on, let’s get you both inside.”

* * *

5.

“Truth or dare.”

“Are you kidding? How old are we?”

“No it’ll be fun.”

Biz drained a bottle in two impressive gulps. “We’ll use this.”

“What, like we didn’t already have twenty empty bottles going already?”

Biz was too excited to pay attention to that piece of logic. He dropped the bottle into the middle of the coffee table and gestured for everyone to come around. They did as they were told. Sometimes when Biz got excited about something that was the only way to handle him.

Tonight wasn’t so much a party as a gathering. Nate was still in Victoria, seemingly unable to cope with the idea of going back home, so Tyson had brought him along again. There were plenty of beers but this time soft music played over the speakers, and the lights were on low, and there were only the six of them: Tyson, Nate, Jamie, Biz, Tyler and Jordie.

It was trade season, so Jamie had half an eye on his phone at all times. He didn’t know when he might be required to call a new trade and do his ‘welcome to Dallas’ speech. Jordie had his eye on his own phone, expecting something he hadn’t spoken about, even to Jamie. Nate and Tyson had been glancing at theirs too, waiting for news they couldn’t begin to guess.

“I’m not doing any weird shit,” Nate said as he plonked down in front of the couch, his back braced against Tyson’s shins.

“Then you’re really not in the right place.”

“Let’s go, let’s go. Jordie, spin first.”

Jordie spun the bottle, nearly sending it flying off the table. Jamie had seen the nerves thrumming through his brother all evening. Something was coming, that much he knew. He’d recognised the furtive voice his brother used with his agent coming through the walls of their family home when the two had been visiting their parents that weekend. And when his Dad had tried to press him on what was happening with his Habs contract Jordie had closed off, shuttering himself from the question completely. And that was not like Jordie at all. It wasn’t hard to guess that his agent had warned of something coming, and Jordie was bracing himself for impact.

The bottle slowed and landed on Tyson, except Nate was sat right at his legs, so there was some argument over who it pointed at.

“We’ll take it in turns. I’ll go first.”

“Fine. Tyson, truth or dare.”

“Truth.”

Jordie leant forward, elbows on his knees, his expression inscrutable. He glanced across quickly at Jamie, who tried his best not to smirk. He knew exactly where his brother was going.

“Who’s Becky Schwartz?”

Tyson’s face fell. “How did you…fucking hell, Jamie, did you tell him?”

Jamie shook his head, lips clamped together. “I never breathed a word, Tyson.”

“We pinkie promised dude!”

“And I respect the pinkie promise. I never said anything.”

Jordie stabbed a finger in Jamie’s direction. “He never said a word, but I heard about something from guys at school, and it’s been driving me insane since tenth grade. Who is Becky Schwartz?”

“Dare,” Tyson blurted out. Nate looked over his shoulder and up at his teammate, a look of surprise and disgust on his face.

“Tys, you’ve got to go with your first choice, that’s the rules. Who the hell is Becky Swartz?”

“No-one.”

“Respect the rules of the game man. Last year Tyler told us that story about that cop back in Toronto.”

Tyler flushed uncharacteristically red from his collarbone to his hairline.

“And you all promised you would never mention that again.”

Tyson patted Nate’s shoulder. “Don’t worry, I’ll fill you in on that later.”

“Don’t you fucking dare.”

“It’s your turn, Tyson. Truth. Who the hell is Becky Swartz?”

Tyson groaned into his hands. “Fine, fine. That year Jamie and I went to the sports camp up in Sidney. The year you had chicken pox, Jordie. We had a social with the girls camp one night. And I knew this girl was there, Becky. We’d met the year before, when the camp was co-ed. She was cute. So I got dressed up smart-”

“His nicest Hawaiian shirt and white shorts.”

“Fuck off Jamie. Anyway, we had this social, and I drank a load of pop and was kind of buzzing. And then I ate some hot dogs. I ate too much, clearly, because I was feeling really sick. We were all sat on the logs around the fire and I managed to get to sit to Becky. I was making her laugh, and it was going really well. Then the dogs kind of…came back.”

“You didn’t shit your pants did you?”

“No! I threw up, down the back of the log. And somehow, I don’t know how, no-one seemed to notice, even Becky. We were all singing and talking, so I guess it covered up the sound of me chucking up like eight hot dogs and two litres of orange soda. I felt better after that, so just stayed where I was. It was all going good with Becky. It was getting late, and she said she was chilly. I thought I’d be a gentleman and get her a jacket. She told me it was behind her on the log. I picked it up…kind of thought it was a bit heavy. Didn’t know why. Couldn’t see, in the dark. And I put it over her shoulders and she suddenly starts screaming.”

Everyone in the room groaned.

“No!”

“Yep. When I’d thrown up I’d literally aimed right inside her jacket, which had fallen on the floor off the back of the seat. When I put it over her shoulders I tipped all the soda and dogs I’d hurled up over her shoulders. It went all down her back, down her front, in her hair. It was everywhere. She was screaming so much that everyone saw, and heard, and everyone turned on their torches and there was just…_orange _puke, all over her.”

It took everyone a while to get their breath back from laughing.

“Oh Tyson, that’s so funny.”

“Did they know it was you?”

“Well it was pretty obvious! I tried to deny it but she was furious, and everyone figured it out, and I wanted to die.”

“He did,” Jamie supplied, tears in his eyes. “He ran off to our cabin and said he was going to walk into the woods until a bear ate him.”

“It was so embarrassing. Thank god we didn’t go back to that camp next year, because I couldn’t have faced those kids or Becky Swartz ever again.”

“I still maintain Tyler’s cop story is more embarrassing.”

“She was my first big crush guys. I literally tipped a stomach full of my own orange vomit all over her. I don’t think I’ll ever get over that.”

“OK next person. Tyson, spin the bottle.”

The next few turns were some low level dares, with Tyson complaining the whole time the dares were not proportionate to his ‘truth’. The last dare involved Tyler stripping naked and running down to the end of the street, which someone had to do every year they played the game. It was a stupid one to use on Tyler, because he had absolutely zero shame. He stood up, flung off his clothes, and sauntered off to the front door without a blush. When they all went to watch him do the dash Jamie had to look out at the lake and do some deep breathing.

Once they all got back inside and Tyler put his shorts back on, Biz spun and the bottle landed on Jamie.

“OK, truth.”

“That’s not fair, Jamie has literally no more embarrassing stories to tell.”

“That’s because Tyson or Jordie have been there for basically everything that has ever happened to me, and they’ve already told everyone.”

“The truth in ‘truth or dare’ doesn’t have to be an embarrassing story. Get him to tell us a secret.”

“I have no secrets,” Jamie said. It was just like his embarrassing stories - everything that had ever happened to him had basically happened around Tyson and Jordie. And if it didn’t, his old school friends or Dallas teammates inevitably told the next person they saw. Apparently Jamie’s private stories were public property.

“That’s not true, there must be something.”

There was Tyler. No game of truth or dare was worth what he had to say about Tyler.

“I really doubt it.”

“Alright, let’s go for your love life.”

“_No_, no.”

Biz was looking at Jamie with a kind of intensity he really didn’t appreciate. “Go on. Maybe it’d be _helpful_ to get out an embarrassing story about your love life.”

Jamie glared back at him. “No. Biz. No.”

An awkward pause fell across the room for a moment.

“Fine,” Biz carried on, like nothing had just happened. “Something easy then. An embarrassing story about your _first_ crush.”

Oh fuck. It wasn’t Biz’s fault that his first crush and Tyler Seguin were exactly the same person.

“Erm…do I have to say their name?”

Biz rolled his eyes. “Fine, no names, just say something not boring about the first crush you ever had. Jesus Jamie, it’s a fun game, don’t take it so seriously.”

Jamie’s heart began to race. It suddenly became clear to him that every story about his first crush related to the guy sat to his right, and he was going to have to say something that was either made up or vague enough that Tyler wouldn’t know it was about him. Problem was, he didn’t have a very good imagination.

“So I fancied…someone, when I was eleven.”

“Eleven, ok. Tell us more. Something funny or embarrassing.”

“OK. Um…we went to that water park up the road, back when it was open. Before that kid fractured his skull on the big slide.”

Tyson sighed. “That was a really good water park. Shame they closed it after that accident.”

“It was a death trap, Tys. We nearly drowned every year we went there. Anyway, I went there. And they were there. And I thought I’d buy them a gift, to show them I fancied them.”

"Them?"

Jamie rolled his eyes. "Him."

Five pairs of eyes blinked back at him expectantly. 

“I went and won him some stupid plushie thing at the games bit. And gave it to him, thinking they’d like it. I thought he did. Except later I saw it floating in the water, and they pretended they didn’t know where it was. I don’t know. Guess he didn’t want it as a gift.”

Jamie shrugged uncomfortably. Biz rolled his eyes.

“Fuck me that was boring.”

“That’s the only story I have, what do you want me to say?!”

“That story just makes me sad,” Nate said, shaking his head. “That’s not the point of truth or dare.”

“Fine.” Jamie spun the bottle maliciously, and low and behold it landed on Nate.

“Tell us then, Nate, a funny and embarrassing story about something to do with your first crush.”

As Nate was telling his story Jamie felt eyes on him. He turned round to see Tyler staring right at him, intensely enough that it made him jump.

“You want another drink?” Jamie asked.

“Er, yeah. Sure.”

Jamie turned and fished one out from the cooler bucket they’d dragged into the living room.

“Thanks,” Tyler said distractedly.

“No problem.”

Nate was almost at the end of the story when Tyler stood up abruptly. “Can I talk to you?” he mouthed at Jamie.

Jamie stood up and followed Tyler onto the deck. He didn’t fail to notice Biz and Nate watching his back as they left. He pulled the sliding doors behind them, the darkness outside offering them some privacy. Tyler walked to the end of the deck, turned around and then paced back again.

“You OK?”

“I didn’t mean to lose that plushie.”

Jamie felt the blood drain out of his face. He thought he’d been so clever with that story. He was sure that Tyler wouldn’t remember that it happened. It was thirteen years ago, and Jamie still carried it around like an open wound. But surely Tyler would have forgotten. It hadn’t meant anything to him. Jamie didn’t dare try to explain himself because…well, he didn’t know what he could even say.

“I loved it when you won it for me. I was going to take it home, put it on my bed. Jesus, I had _such _a big crush on you Jamie. You were older than me, and so cute, and you were so nice to me. And I just…you gave me the plushie and I loved it. But we were there with so many guys, and they were messing around with everything. I wanted to keep it safe but they kept going on about it. They snatched it off me and made it have a go on a ride. It ended up in one of the pools and I was too embarrassed to go and get it. I thought they’d just laugh at me. I’m sorry, Jamie.”

Jamie stuttered for a moment before he found the words.

“Er…th-that’s ok, Tyler. I get it. I didn’t even know you’d remember.”

“Of course I remembered! It was the first gift you gave me. And I wanted to keep it. I even went back that evening to see if someone had handed it in, but it wasn’t in their lost and found. Some other kid must have taken it home. I felt so embarrassed.”

Jamie shook his head. “It’s OK. It was years ago.”

“No,” Tyler said, with a fierceness that alarmed Jamie. “You said you got that plushie for your first crush. Is that true?”

“I…” Jamie thought about lying. About trying to turn an old forgotten story into something more exciting just to get off his turn on truth or dare. But after all these years, he just didn’t have the fight in any more. “Yeah. It’s true. I had a huge crush on you, Tyler. The minute I met you playing street hockey.”

Tyler was still moving, prowling up and down the deck like an animal in a cage. But his eyes never left Jamie’s.

“Is it still true?”

“What?”

“You said I was your first crush. So how do you feel about me now?”

Jamie swallowed. He thought of Nate and how he’d admitted his own feelings to Erik. And how Erik had turned them down so swiftly. The fear strangled him. He couldn’t say anything for a while, just stare back at the intense, unreadable look in Tyler’s eyes.

The words burst out of him eventually. “I fancied you when I first saw you playing street hockey fifteen years ago and I haven’t stopped. You’ve always been one of my best friends Tyler but…yeah, I’ve wanted it to be different. Ever since we met. But I get that you don’t feel the same as me. I get it. I didn’t want to make it awkward.”

“Fifteen years?” Tyler said back at him. He’d stilled completely. His voice was so quiet. “Fifteen years.”

“Fifteen years,” Jamie agreed. He felt a shame wash over him like a terrible wave of nausea. This was it. This was the moment Tyler turned and left, disgusted at the idea of his best friend harbouring feelings for him in secret for all these years.

Tyler took three big strides towards him, put his hands out. He caught Jamie by his shirt and pulled him down.

It wasn’t an elegant first kiss, not by any means. It was fierce and uncoordinated and Jamie’s brain still hadn’t caught up by the time Tyler pulled away.

“You’re an idiot,” Tyler said against Jamie’s lips, as he’d barely moved an inch. “And I’m a fucking idiot.”

“What?” It was all Jamie could manage to get out.

“I’ve had a crush on you since I was ten,” Tyler whispered into Jamie’s jaw when he next broke away. “And I thought you were just…I thought you had your own life and your own stuff going on, especially when you went to the NHL and your life was so different to mine. I thought I was just your summer friend.”

He traced a cold finger down Jamie’s cheek. “Jesus, we are so fucking stupid.”

And all at once Jamie’s senses came to him. The warmth of Tyler pressed down his front, the grip of his fingertips in his clothes, the taste of him in his mouth, the sound of his breathing right against his chest. He wound his arms around Tyler’s waist, pulled him close. It was like taking a breath on dry land after treading water for so long. Familiar, even though it was new. Sharp and clear, so right. And with his new found clarity he kissed Tyler back. He couldn’t tell him with his words what this meant to him, this breaking of a fifteen year dam he’d built in his head. Tyler was untouchable, unreachable, this incredible thing he was frightened to dream of for fear he’d break what they’d had. Now he was here, kissing him ferociously.

“We should have done that years ago.”

“Yeah. Definitely, yes.”

“Can I hear Biz chanting our names?”

“Ignore him. I’ll fill you in later.”

* * *

6.

Jamie almost yanked the door off its hinges when Tyler arrived. He was nervous, for some reason. It felt like every time Jamie was out of Tyler’s eye line he’d get other ideas, or see someone he fancied more, or just come to his senses and decide it was all a mistake. So Jamie was pleasantly surprised when Tyler launched over the threshold and landed a big kiss on Jamie the minute the door was open.

“We’re here!”

“We?”

“Look who I brought.”

Three labradors rushed Jamie in a big ball of brown, black and white fluff. They sniffed Jamie and accepted his adoration, then the two older dogs rushed off to do their usual routine of finding bits of dropped food or begging people for affection. Gerry stumbled after them, still ungainly with his big paws he’d yet to grow into.

“I didn’t know you were bringing them over.”

“Gerry has had his last shot and can now officially leave the house. I thought I’d get him used to parties. And he loves attention. He’ll be so happy.”

Jamie pulled Tyler in through the door and shut it behind him.

“Hey,” he said. He knew he was grinning like an idiot.

“Hey yourself.”

Jordie found them some time later, plastered up against one another in the hallway.

“My god, let’s keep the R rated stuff out of my sight, ok? Jamie, I need help with the BBQ. Put him down.”

They were kept apart for the next hour or so, Tyler catching up with friends and minding his dogs, and Jamie helping Jordie to do the BBQ and arguing with Biz about bragging rights over his and Tyler’s revealing moment the other night.

“If it weren’t for my pact, and _my _question at the truth or dare, you two would still be staring at each other like love sick puppies.”

Jamie didn’t want to admit but…yeah. He had Paul Bissonnette to thank for this new relationship with Tyler. Now if that wasn’t a frightening thought, he didn’t know what was.

He found Tyler some time later, and ran after him when he suggested they find a bit of alone time. They were in the middle of an intense session in one of the Barrie household’s many bedrooms when someone called Tyler’s name.

“Tyler! Hey, Tyler!”

Tyler sighed into Jamie’s neck. “When are we going to get some time alone?”

“We’ll have to plan it in.”

“Tyler!”

“What?!” Tyler hollered back through the door.

“Gerry pooped on the deck! Then Biz stood in it with his bare feet like a fucking idiot and it’s all over the place.”

Tyler groaned and opened up the door to Nate in the corridor. 

“OK, I don’t want to have to clean that up, but I can’t believe I missed Biz do that.”

“Don’t worry, Tyson filmed it. Should be on Instagram by now.”

Jamie helped Tyler clear up the Gerry mess, both avoiding Biz’s protestation they needed to help clean his feet as well. The day was turning into dusk, and Tyler looked brilliant in this light. Topless, his hair wild, his trigger happy smile. Jamie pulled him out onto the deck to have him all to himself again.

It was sometime later when a car they didn’t recognise rolled up the driveway. Jamie and Tyler turned to watch it attempt to find a space and then just stop wherever it could fit. Someone stepped out - tall, fair haired, but his face was blurred by the pattern of street lights.

“Oh shit.”

“What?”

“Is that Erik Johnson?”

Jamie peered through the darkness. Yep, that was Erik Johnson.

“What is he doing here? Did Nate invite him?”

“I doubt it.”

“Why?”

“OK, don’t tell anyone, but the reason Nate’s here this summer is because he blurted out to Erik that he fancied him. And it didn’t go down well, and he needed a distraction.”

Tyler winced. “Ouch. Poor Nate.”

“Yeah. But now EJ’s here…that’s a good sign right?”

“I don’t know, but you’d better warn Nate. Go find him.”

“Can you distract Erik?”

“He doesn’t know who I am! You distract him, I’ll find Nate.”

Tyler gave Jamie a shove off the deck, so he didn’t have much chance to argue. He thrashed through the ornamental bushes that closed off the side of the house from the front and fell out the other side. Erik nearly dropped his keys and wallet in surprise.

“Hi! Sorry. I was just…hi Erik.”

“Oh, hi Jamie,” Erik said, still squinting at him and looking a little alarmed. They shook hands awkwardly. Jamie was sure he hadn’t ever spoken more than ten words to EJ in his whole life. He vaguely remembered stepping on the guy’s foot at an NHL Awards party years ago.

“I was coming to see Tyson and Nate. Didn’t realise they were having a party.”

“Oh, I’m sure they don’t mind. It’s not too big.”

The two tall hockey players stood staring at each other for a long, stilted moment.

“Um…”

“So, did you have a good flight?”

“Yes,” EJ said slowly, looking Jamie up and down carefully. Jamie was sure he had greenery in his hair, but didn’t want to check.

“Where from?”

“California.”

“Oh, nice. Whereabouts in California?”

Erik blinked. “Long Beach.”

“Cool, cool,” Jamie opened and closed his mouth a few times before saying. “I’ve never been to Long Beach.”

“OK.”

“Is it nice?”

“Is Long Beach nice?”

“Yeah.”

“Um, yeah. It’s nice.”

“Good. Good. You’re not from there right though?”

Erik transferred his wallet and keys to his other hand. Jamie didn’t fail to notice the long look he gave the house over his shoulder.

“No. I was born in Minnesota.”

“Oh cool. I haven’t been to Minnesota either.”

Erik definitely looked confused now. “Yes. You have. To play the Wild.”

“Shit, yeah. I forgot about them. Saint Paul is pretty cool. Is that where you’re from?”

“Erm,” Erik said, scratching his head, “Do you know where I could find Tyson or Nate? I need to say hello.”

“Sure, sure. Um, wait there, I’ll get them.”

Erik called after him but Jamie was off, up the front stairs and slamming the door before Erik could follow him in. Jamie found Tyson, Nate and Tyler in the game room. Either they’d cleared everyone out of there or no-one was moving far from the alcohol.

“OK I’ve embarrassed myself in front of Erik for long enough.”

Nate looked panicked. And sweaty.

“Did he say why he was here?”

“He said he wanted to speak to you and Tyson, that was all. He’s come straight from the airport.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Nate whispered to himself, one hand pulling at his hair.

“You’ve just got to go and talk to him, Nate. See what he has to say.”

“He’ll just give me the whole ‘no homo’ routine! I bet he talked to Gabe. I bet Gabe told him he had to come and smooth it over before the season starts. Tys, did Gabe tell you anything?”

“He hasn’t said a word and I haven’t told him, you asked me not to. It might be good news.”

“He could have called me with good news! He obviously talked to Gabe, and Gabe told him to be a man and talk to me about it, and to do it face to face. He’s here to let me down gently and tell me not to fuck up the team. Shit, shit, shit.”

“I think you’re speculating a bit now,” Tyson said, hand on Nate’s arm. “Dude, it’ll be fine. I swear. It’s EJ. EJ’s not going to make you feel bad about this, whatever happens. He’s a good guy.”

Nate let out a long unsteady breath. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.”

“Hi guys.”

The little group jumped out of their skin at Erik’s interruption. He was standing at the door to the game room, still with his keys and wallet in his hand, his eyebrows wandering up to his hairline. He didn’t have his front teeth in, which somehow made him look all the more surprised.

“Hey EJ,” Tyson said. He strode over and gave his teammate a hug. “Nice to see you man.”

“Sorry for just dropping in.”

“I don’t mind, you’re always welcome.”

The rest of the group pretended not to hear EJ whisper to Tyson that he needed to speak to Nate alone. But they did hustle out on Tyson’s instruction, leaving Erik and Nate alone in the games room. Tyson closed the door behind them.

“OK. Guess we just have to wait.”

They were in the room for a long, long time. Jamie was distracted.

“Do I need to get naked before you listen to what I’m saying?” Tyler asked, though he was laughing.

“Sorry. I just feel bad for Nate. I kind of…know what was he going through.”

Tyler smiled sweetly and ran a hand through Jamie’s hair. “You were always safe, Jamie.”

“I know that _now_. But for years I didn’t.”

“You know what makes me sad?” Tyler asked, pressing a kiss to the side of Jamie’s mouth.

“What?”

“That we didn’t do this years ago.”

“Yeah, me too. But we can’t change that. We can just enjoy it now.”

Tyler slipped his arms around Jamie’s waist and squeezed. “Oh believe me, I will. I just don’t know when we’ll get to ‘enjoy’ it properly before you go back to Dallas, because I’m living with my Mom and wherever you go, Jordie goes too.”

“Oh, so you just want to get me into bed? Only want me for my body?”

“I knew you when you had that tragic hair and all those paisley shirts. No. You’re the whole package Jamie Benn,” Tyler said, grinning devilishly. He trailed a finger up down Jamie’s and settled his fingertips just under the waistband of his shorts. Jamie shivered. “But who could blame me now if I did?”

They were interrupted once again by Jordie.

“Bring some beers out will you?” Jordie asked them, his arms laden with packages of meat. “And if you’re more than ten minutes I’m going to bring the garden hose in here and turn it on the pair of you.”

Jamie sighed and peeled himself away from Tyler.

“I’ll talk to Jordie tomorrow. Convince him to go to visit his girlfriend for a bit.”

Tyler pulled open the fridge and started to pick out the beers. “Either that or warn him I’m _very _loud in bed. That’ll get him out of here.”

Jamie felt his face heat up. “Is that true?”

Tyler looked over his shoulder with the dirtiest of smiles. “You’ll have to wait and see.”

Jamie took a deep breath to keep from falling over and took the beers proffered to him.

“Oh hey, there’s some of those German ones you like in far back. Grab those.”

“Thanks baby.”

Jamie put down the beers and snagged Tyler around his middle.

“What?”

“That’s my favourite one.”

“That’s your favourite what?”

“Baby. It’s my favourite nickname.”

“Oh.” Tyler turned and kissed him over his shoulder. “So it’s definitely not Buttercup?”

“It is _definitely_ not.”

“Damn.”


	3. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The epilogue.

Another summer in Victoria. Jamie stretched out on the dock on the lake, listening to the familiar hum of boats out on the water and wasps dive bombing the sticky trails of their spilt beer. Tyson was talking loudly about something but his voice just blended in to the background pattern of noise.

That previous summer had been amazing. There’d been the new and exciting relationship with Tyler. There’d been the readjusting to being a couple. There’d been parties and EJ had been there for ten days - at first stand-offish with the guys and unsure about him and Nate, but then finally breaking and coming out of his shell, and lighting up with his toothless grin and a dry sense of humour Jamie hadn’t expected of him. Nate had been like a different guy. Loud, effusive, giggly, and flushing every time EJ so much as looked at him.Nobody heard in any detail what had happened in that room that night when Erik arrived out of the blue. Only that Erik came out looking freaked out but happy, and Nate came out looking bowled over and in shock. They’d been awkward around each other. But Erik stayed there as long as Nate did, and more than a couple of them caught their lingering gazes.

When everything was over after that summer Jamie had been excited to get back to hockey, but anxious about what was to come with him and Tyler. Would long distance work?

And then…the hockey season. And this summer, everything was different. It was weird, and new, but he had just had to adapt to it. Today was one of those days he woke up not knowing how to feel, not knowing what the hell was going on, but taking it hour by hour anyway.

Jordie squeezed Jamie’s shoulder.

“You ok?” he asked. He’d been on big brother duty more than usual this summer. Jamie appreciated it today more than ever.

Jordie was a Canuck now. They’d found out about it at one of their last parties of the summer, which turned out to be one of the most epic. It just felt right that his brother would end back here, in British Columbia, where they’d both started their journeys. It had felt even more right to see Jordie fly around in a blue Canucks jersey when they’d met during their few scheduled games of the regular season.

“Yeah, I’m good. Just…”

“No, of course. You need another beer. Tyson, throw Jamie a beer.”

Jamie felt someone slide down onto the deck next to him.

“Hey,” Jamie said. He couldn’t help the stupid grin on his face.

“Hey,” Tyler whispered. He guided Jamie’s lips to his and they kissed until both were breathless.

“Ugh, it’s like last summer all over again.”

“Isn’t your honeymoon phase over yet?”

Tyler flashed them all a grin and his middle finger. “Just because we’re happy. You’re all jealous.”

“I know one way this summer’s different to last year,” Jordie said, nudging his brother. Jamie laughed and reached behind him. The Stanley Cup glinted in the low angled sun as he hauled it into position to stand between his legs.

The group erupted into cheers, banging their beers against the dock in a clatter of noise and whooping. Tyler smacked a huge kiss on Jamie’s cheek.

“This year you’re Stanley Cup winning captain,” he said in Jamie’s ear under all the noise.

“That’s not the only thing I’ve won in the last year,” Jamie said, squeezing Tyler by his waist.

“That’s the corniest thing I’ve ever heard.”

“I’m corny. Deal with it baby.”


End file.
